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| Completely useless |
Words can’t even describe how incredibly happy I am to announce that I
have paid off 1/3 of my debt in under a year! I started this debt repayment
journey on October 21, 2010 and here I am, less than a year into it, and ahead
of my goal! It won’t be long before I have my MasterCard completely paid off
and I will save so much money on interest! Can you believe that I still pay $70
per month in interest just on my credit card? I don’t know why I ever let it
get to this point in the first place. The thing is that we all use credit
cards, but we don’t all use them in a smart way. If you are a smart credit card
user, you make a payment the same day that you buy something and you get a card
that does 1% cash back. You can actually make money off of the credit cards.
You might be thinking, big deal, what’s a measly 1%, but the reality is that
when you take 1% for every $1,500 that you spend, that $15 in your bank
account! It’s like getting paid to shop and it’s freaking wonderful. I plan on
doing something like that once I have my MasterCard banished into the fires of
credit hell because right now I am getting those super useless Airmiles, which
if you don’t have thousands of, they’re pretty pointless. So yeah, cash back or
some kind of actually good rewards program.
Now enough with that ranting about plans when my credit card will be
paid off (which is only a few more months away) and on to my challenge! As you
heard from my last post, I started a 30 day challenge to not buy any food
outside of the grocery store (including coffee, snacks, poutine) and make one
gourmet meal per week. Not to mention I also have to do 5 yoga practices per
week and on the other 2 days, I have to do a 10 minute meditation. This
challenge started on Wednesday and the results have been completely successful
so far! Admittedly, since most people know that I am doing this challenge, they
have been extra supportive and not pushing me to eat out. I’ve also had two
lovely ladies buy me coffee (from Starbucks no less) when I was looking a little
worse for wear. It’s amazing how something as simple as a cup of coffee can
really brighten your day!
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| My worst nightmare |
This challenge has proved to be really, well, challenging at times
though. There are moments when I come home and really just want to order a
pizza, or the other morning I was so tired and I forgot to make myself coffee
before I went to the yoga studio every coffee shop seemed to call out to me,
enter me John, come inside me and give me your money, but I didn’t give into
their seductions. An added challenge for me was when I went and made a purchase
for the yoga studio at the local farmers’ market. There were lots of delicious
baked treats there that I was so ready to whip my wallet out for, but that
wasn’t the real challenge. The biggest challenge was what I had to purchase – apples. Now, you’re thinking, oh yeah,
apples are in season right now and they are so delicious – WRONG. Those of you,
who know me well, know that I have a hatred and borderline phobia of raw
apples. I don’t know what it is, but the (I’m getting anxious just typing this)
feeling of peeled raw apples and the sound and texture of them makes me really
uncomfortable. I have gotten A LOT better over the years, but buying those
apples was the first time I had purchased apples in well over a decade. I’m
serious when I say I really hate them. I love apple juice, and anything
involving cooked apples, but if that apple is raw (even if it’s a caramel
apple) I cannot handle it.
Side tangent – once I went to my friend Maya’s farm to stay there for a
weekend and I helped them pick a whole whack of apples; this is something that
I did often when I was a kid and I think it has something to do with why I hate
them so much now. I hate climbing to heights, and it makes my palms sweat when
I think about climbing and potentially falling, so I think that has somehow
managed to tie itself to raw apples. Anyway, after the apple picking, I was
given a bag full of apples to take home – talk about ironic. Since I don’t eat
raw apples, I decided that I was going to make myself an Apple Crisp so I began
to peel the apples. It took me at least 20 minutes to peel 4 or 5 apples. I had
to set the apples down every time that I would touch the peeled apple parts.
What was worse is that when it came time to have to cut the apples, I couldn’t.
I hated it so much I had to ask my partner to cut the apples while I went as
far away as possible from the sound. I know, I am bat$hit crazy. But the point is
that I still did more with apples than I had in a long time. Every now and then
I do try to eat a piece of raw apple because I acknowledge that my raw apple
problem is completely insane.
So what is the point of that story; well, I guess to teach you that
sometimes you need to do something that scares you or that you are worried to
do in order to get ahead. If you never try, you’re never going to learn what
you need to do to succeed. When I bought those apples, I felt good that I had
done something that I would never normally do and I faced my (completely
stupid) loathing of raw apples head on. Thank you (and Happy Birthday) Katie
for getting me to do something that I wouldn’t normally do and pushing me
outside my comfort zone.
As I was saying earlier, the challenge is going very well. I have been
maintaining my no eating out goal and making delicious meals for myself. Today
I am going to try making Chicken Vindaloo, again, thank you Gojee.com for
giving me a great recipe that uses things I already have in my cupboards! I
think I’ll start posting links to the recipes I love for you guys to try. I’m
not going to turn this into another cooking blog though! This challenge has
added in an extra element of exposure for me too. I got to open up and share
this process with a number of new people doing the 30-day challenge and the
reception to my blog is always heartwarming! I plan to do a weekly Wednesday
updates on the challenge so that you can see how I have progressed!
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| Gorgeous! |
In other news, I bought this beautiful print by local artist StephenFrew for only $10 at an art show/concert yesterday! I want to buy the original giant paiting, but I am on this budget
so I think I will have to wait a bit before I buy any artwork for the
apartment. What was even better was that I got to check out my friend’s new
band called Bearshark! What a great name for a band. The crappy news though is that I am going back to French
classes starting on October 11, so I think that I will be extra challenged to
do the yoga and cooking that week! It’s so hard to stay in the same room with
one person for 3 hours 3 days a week! Oh well, eff it!
See you Wednesday!
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